Ryanair faces lawsuit in Spain as unions threaten STRIKES across four countries THIS WEEK

HOLIDAYMAKERS are facing more problems in the skies this week as unions are threatening strike action against Ryanair across four countries.

Additionally, the Spanish pilots union Sepla has announced it is suing the low-cost airline in Spain’s High Court over its pilot contracts.

Sepla represents around 500 of the 800 Ryanair pilots in Spain.

In a statement the union said, “After a year of negotiations, the failure of Ryanair to recognise Sepla and apply Spanish labour legislation for the pilots who operate in
Spain forces the union to take a legal path to attain this objective. “

“The only thing we want is for our pilots to have the same rights and obligations as established by Spanish regulations, as well as the negotiation of a statutory collective agreement as other airlines in the same sector of the competition have.”

The budget Irish airline Ryanair has also confirmed that it has received notice of pilot strikes by in two countries this week and believe unions in two other countries will coordinate walkouts at the same time.

The strikes could lead to the cancellation of flights across Europe during the peak holiday season.

The airline said it has received notice of strikes by pilot unions in Belgium and Sweden on Friday, August 10.

It added that it has also been notified of possible strike actions by pilot unions in Germany and the Netherlands which they ‘believe will occur and be coordinated’ on the same date.

Ryanair says it has written to each of the unions and invited them to meet to make further progress in concluding union recognition and collective labour agreements.

They say, “In the interim, we have requested these pilot unions to give us seven days’ notice of any planned strike action so that we can notify our customers of cancelled flights in advance and offer them alternative flights or refunds.”

Ryanair boss Michael O’Leary has threatened to transfer more staff and aircraft to Poland if the strikes continue.

He said, “If we have people who just want to have strikes for the sake of having strikes then they can have strikes and they’ll find themselves (with) jobs getting moved and aircraft getting moved.